Latin American Baseball History

Baseball was introduced to Latin America in the 1860s by Cuban students returning from colleges in the United States and American sailors who ported in the country. The sport spread quickly across the island nation after its introduction, with student Nemesio Guillot receiving popular credit date for the game's growth in the mid-19th century. Nemesio attended Spring Hill College in
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Baseball was introduced to Latin America in the 1860s by Cuban students returning from colleges in the United States and American sailors who ported in the country. The sport spread quickly across the island nation after its introduction, with student Nemesio Guillot receiving popular credit date for the game's growth in the mid-19th century. Nemesio attended Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama, with his brother Ernesto. The two returned to Cuba, and in 1868 they founded the first baseball team in Cuba, the Habana Base Ball Club.
Soon after this, the first Cuban War of Independence spurred Spanish authorities in 1869 to ban the sport in Cuba. They were concerned that Cubans had begun to prefer baseball to bullfights, which Cubans were expected to dutifully attend as homage to their Spanish rulers in an informal cultural mandate. As such, baseball became symbolic of freedom and egalitarianism to the Cuban people.
Baseball was first brought to the Dominican Republic by Cuban sugar planters who arrived in the country in the 1870s. Cuban sugar planters began providing baseball equipment to their workers as a diversion to keep up morale. Much of the labor force of the sugar industry was made up of migrants from the British West Indies, and were familiar with cricket. Several semi-professional baseball clubs were founded in the early 20th century, most notably Santo Domingo's storied Tigres del Licey. The U.S. occupation from 1916 to 1924 resulted in further inroads, as military administrators provided money to form and purchase equipment for amateur clubs, while organizing games between Dominican clubs and U.S. Marines.
Baseball began in Puerto Rico in 1896. A Puerto Rican that was born in Brooklyn started practicing a group of men, some of them Cuban students who already knew the game from back home. Two years later, January 9, 1898, the first official game was held at the Velodromo, Stop 15, Santurce. Games kept going until March of that year because of the advent of the Spanish–American War, stopping all baseball activities until November 1899.
Baseball in Venezuela originates with the early twentieth century cultural influence of United States oil companies, and is the country's leading sport. The Venezuelan Professional Baseball League (VPBL) is a winter league that was established in 1945.
The Mexican League was founded in 1925 by sportswriter Alejandro Aguilar Reyes and former baseball player Ernesto Carmona. It is today considered a minor league, albeit without any MLB team affiliations. (show less)

At the end of the season, the championship teams from Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Dominican, and Mexico are invited to the Caribbean World Series. Other countries typically attend the lesser Latin American Series.